"Rockdale, my hometown, is Texas' heart and significant part of its soul," George Sessions Perry wrote in his book, Texas: A World Unto Itself. Perry wrote with lifelong affection about his hometown, first as a novelist and later as a magazine journalist. He describes the pioneers of Rockdale as typical of restless Southerners who hitched their wagons and moved to Texas after the Civil War. . . . Clay Coppedge . . .

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Friday, February 14, 2014

1957 :: Missing Author Found Drowned

Missing Author Found Drowned. Police Say George Sessions Perry Is 'Apparent Suicide' -- Body in River Near Home. Special to The New York Times. Madison, Conn., Feb. 13 -- The body of George Sessions Perry was found today in the East River here. The 46-year-old author disappeared two months ago from his home in Guilford, about two miles away. Police Chief Jacob Rickert said Mr. Perry had "apparently committed suicide by drowning." Dr. Susan Spencer, town medical examiner, said there were no marks on the body to indicate violence. The body was found by Edward Lambert, a steel company employe. He had been checking material for a bridge over the river, a narrow tidal inlet of Long Island Sound, at a point a quarter of a mile north of U. S. Route 1. Identification was made by George Heinold, assistant police chief and a close friend of Mr. Perry. An autopsy was ordered.

Clothes Are Missing. The body was unclad except for a pair of socks. When last seen on Dec. 13 at his home on Clapboard Hill, Mr. Perry had worn a tweed jacket, corduroy trousers and heavy shoes. The police believed the body had been imprisoned in heavy ice, which was freed by recent mild weather. Mr. Perry, who was six feet four inches tall, suffered a nervous breakdown a year ago. He had been crippled by arthritis. He was home Dec. 13 when his wife left for a dentist's appointment. When she returned he was missing. The Perry house and the river are separated by woods and salt marshes. The area was scoured by police and volunteers for weeks after the writer's disappearance. Chief Rickert said Mr. Perry apparently had entered the river north of the point where the body was found. The river is the boundary between Madison and Guilford. Mr. Perry, a native of Texas, was known for his "Cities of America" series in the Saturday Evening Post. He wrote several novels and was a World War II correspondent. Mrs. Perry, the former Claire E. Hodges, was in Villanova, Pa. The couple had no children. New York Times, February 14, 1957